ERIC HENRI KENNINGTON (1888-1960) An Infantryman. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR £14,000
The first-ever sale by an international auction house dedicated exclusively to a celebration of the male form in art takes place at Bonhams in London on June 16. It ranges from Antiquities and Old Master painting to sculpture and decorative arts, from contemporary art to photography.
The sale is curated by Bonhams Greek Art Specialist Anastasia Orfanidou and Bonhams Head of Books and Manuscripts, Matthew Haley, who said: “This exciting new concept challenges a market that has traditionally been centred around the western concept of the male gaze. It will explore how women look at men and how men look at other men, introducing a fresh context and platform that will spark new discussions on an historically unspoken market.”
Among the highlights is Atlas Beach by Patrick Hennessy (Irish, 1915-1980) which depicts the terrace of well-known gay bar The Charles Atlas Beach Bar, which overlooks Tangier City Beach, Morocco. It is estimated at £5,000-£7,000.
Atlas Beach by Patrick Hennessy. UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR £9,562
Materials Matter is the title of a new show by Eilis O’Connell RHA, one of Ireland’s leading artists, which opens at the Solomon Gallery in Dublin today and runs until June 19. The exhibition presents new sculpture and drawing made before and during the Covid pandemic, combining sculpture made in collaboration with skilled stone carvers in Pietrasanta, Italy and a range of self contained innovative work created within the limitations of lockdown. Using materials such as steel, bronze, stone and new bio resins, O’Connell explores different material properties to make hybrid organic geometric forms that she carves or constructs by hand.
Eilis O’Connell – Double Void, Carrara marble, edition of 3
A treasure trove of archive papers and personal objects belonging to the late Professor Stephen Hawking has been acquired by two leading UK cultural institutions, facilitated through Christie’s Heritage and Taxation Advisory Service.
Following an Acceptance In Lieu (AIL) agreement between the Hawking Estate and the UK Government the archive of Professor Stephen Hawking’s scientific and personal papers will remain in Cambridge at the University Library. The entire contents of Hawking’s office will be preserved as part of the Science Museum Group Collection, with selected highlights going on display at the Science Museum in 2022.
Professor Hawking’s archive contains letters dating from 1944-2008, a first draft of A Brief History of Time, film and tv scripts and autograph scientific manuscripts from the early phase of his career. There is a large collection of photographs, papers and correspondence with Popes, US Presidents and leading scientists of the age, including Nobel Prize winners Kip Thorne and Roger Penrose. The archive will be made available to current and future generations of scientists continuing his ground-breaking work in theoretical physics, and will provide future biographers and science historians with an extraordinary gateway and insight into Hawking’s life and work.
These bespoke stage jackets designed by L’Wren Scott for her partner Mick Jagger will highlight an online sale at Christie’s from June 9-July 1. The L’Wren Scott Collection sale comprises 55 curated lots designed between 2006 and 2014. The ‘glamouflage’ jacket on the left was worn by Mick Jagger during the Rolling Stones’ headline performance at Glastonbury in 2013. The Butterfly jacket on the right was worn during the celebrated Hyde Park concert, part of the Rolling Stones’ ‘50 & Counting’ live tour in 2013. Jagger wore it while performing ‘Miss You’, when large screens surrounding the Hyde Park stage showed blue butterflies, identical to those on his jacket, fluttering skywards as a tribute to the late Brian Jones, reminiscent of their 1969 Hyde Park concert when white butterflies were released into the sky in his honour. The jackets are estimated at £20,000-£30,000 each.
The Return of Ulysses by Hughie O’Donoghue comes up as lot 90 at Whyte’s Irish and International art sale online in Dublin on May 31. It dates to 2006/7, two years before the Irish Museum of Modern Art celebrated this acclaimed artist with a major exhibition of 27 works. O’Donoghue is now represented by the prestigious Marlborough Gallery in London. This work is estimated at €8,000-€12,000. UPDATE: THIS MADE 8,500 AT HAMMER.
The most important Brontë material to come to light in a generation and two of the greatest Scottish manuscripts in private hands are to come under the hammer at Sotheby’s. Thought lost for almost a century the Honresfield Library was assembled with passion by self-made Victorian industrialists Alfred and William Law at the turn of the 20th century and has since been maintained with care by generations of the Law family. A unique treasury replete with cornerstones of British culture, its re-emergence after almost 100 years in obscurity marks a defining moment for bibliophiles in what is set to be the one of the great library sales of recent years.
Emily and Anne Brontë autograph manuscripts
Among the library’s holdings is the most important material by the Brontë sisters to come to light in a generation – unrivalled in importance by any other private collection. The rare pieces open a window onto the short but amazing lives of Charlotte, Emily, Anne and even Branwell Brontë.
Treasures include an extremely rare handwritten copy of Emily’s poems, with revisions from Charlotte (£800,000-1,200,000) and the well-loved Brontë family copy of Bewick’s History of British Birds, the book made famous in the opening pages of Jane Eyre (£30,000-50,000), brimming with entertaining annotations from their father Patrick. Little-seen letters to and from fellow novelist Elizabeth Gaskell, Hartley Coleridge (son of poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge), George Smith, publisher and vital champion of ‘The Bells’ (The Brontës’ secretive pseudonym), and many more, abound.
Sir Walter Scott autograph manuscript
Scottish literature is also at the heart of the collection, which includes the most important manuscript by Scotland’s national poet, Robert Burns, in private hands. A compendium of poems, notes and ideas put together by Burns as an unknown twenty-four year old, First Commonplace Book offers a unique insight into the bard’s mind. It was last sold at Sotheby’s in 1879, for £10. The collection includes individual handwritten manuscripts of Burns’s poems and original letters to friends, family, patrons and lovers which build a picture of his colourful life.
Robert Burns First Commonplace Book
Romantic writer Sir Walter Scott – the second-most quoted writer in the Oxford English Dictionary after Shakespeare – is also represented, most notably by the complete manuscript for Rob Roy, one of the last remaining manuscripts of a great 19th century novel that is not now in an institution. There are Jane Austen first editions, including Emma, Northanger Abbey, Persuasion, Pride and Prejudice, a copy of Don Quixote printed in 1620 for Edward Blounte, the publisher for the First Folio of Shakespeare’s plays, and an annotated copy of Alfred Lord Tennyson’s poems with pages showing author’s changes from proof printing in his hand. Homer, Ovid, the Grimm Brothers, Montaigne, Ann Radcliffe, Horace Walpole, Charles Dickens and Mary Wollstonecraft are among those making an appearance.More than 500 historic manuscripts, exceptional first editions, intimate letters and beautiful bindings will be offered across three auctions at Sotheby’s. The first auctions open for bidding from July 2-13 next. Exhibitions of highlights are to take place in London, Edinburgh and New York.
UPDATE: Sotheby’s has postponed this auction to allow for negotiations for the entirety of the library to be acquired by a consortium of institutions for the nation.
A total of 443 lots will come under the hammer at Morgan O’Driscoll’s online sale of affordable Irish art on May 31. Among them is Black Brolly, Blue Brolly by Simeon Stafford. Lot 31 is estimated at €1,000-€1,500.
SIMEON STAFFORD – BLACK BROLLY, BLUE BROLLY. UPDATE: THIS MADE 1,100 AT HAMMER
Thibault Duval has been appointed head of the newly formed Asian Art department at James Adam in Dublin. Educated in Paris at Ecole du Louvre he is a member of the Société des Amis du Musée Guimet, Paris and of the London Oriental Ceramic Society. M. Duval holds a BA in Law from the Sorbonne and has trained at leading museums and auction houses. He launched an Asian art department at a North American auction house, returning to Paris in 2013. Latterly he has been head of the Asian Art department at Drouot in Paris. He has travelled extensively in Asia and practices Chinese calligraphy. There will be an Asian art sale with 500 lots at Adams on June 29.
UNTITLED BY HELEN FRANKENTHALER (1928-2011). UPDATE: THIS SOLD FOR £176,400
THIS work by the American Abstract Expressionist painter Helen Frankenthaler features at Sotheby’s online sale of Women Artists which runs until May 27. The artist was a major contributed to American painting in the post war years. It is estimated at £90,000-£120,000. The sale, dedicated to female artists across the centuries, spans 400 years. Among the artists represented, many of whom have been marginalised over time, are Lavinia Fontana, Rachel Ruysch, Dame Laura Knight, Berthe Morisot, Dorothea Tanning, Dame Elisabeth Frink, Cindy Sherman, Dame Magdalene Odundo and Helen Frankenthaler.
The Old Mill by Norah McGuinness (1901-1980) comes up at Morgan O’Driscoll’s online Irish art sale which ends this evening. It is estimated at 2,500-3,500. The sale has aroused considerable interest and large numbers have already placed bids. UPDATE: THIS MADE 4,000 AT HAMMER
